The Austin weekly statesman. (Austin, Tex.) 1883-1898, 1887-03-17
LAUNDERING BY WIRE.
ERRORS WHICH BRING ANNOYANCE,
AMUSEMENT OR LOSS.
Blame Which Properly Belongs to the
Operators-How Long Circuits and
Weak Currents Play the Mischief
Blunders of Bad Writing

llLS IypS' lHe llleLlSeuU COuuposlOoh
has become an expression of satirical re-
proach in newspaper Offices, and plumbers
are naturally shouldered upon him, no mat
ter by whom made. 1t is not alone in the
composing room that ridiculous errors occur.
The telegraph Office is one of the most fruit
full fields for what are termed bulls in
telegraphers' nomenclature, that is, errors
made in transmitting messages, whereby
they are rendered meaningless, or, as some-
times occurs, serious subjects are trans
formed into jokes.
There are very good reasons, no doupt,
for some of the mistakes recorded against
telegraph operators. There are no excuses,
no good reasons, for others. Some are tho
result of sheer stupidity, ignorant operators
being set to do work requiring not alone
skill in manipulating key, but intelligence
behind ALL No doubt poor penmanshlp is
responsible for the errors of the telegraph
as it is for the blunders of the composing
room. The operator who reads "hearse'
for horse may have had his copy written by
the same editor who dashed OFF criticism
on ''Girone Giroaa," and who was dumb
founded to find that the compositor had
made it Smile Snoffle" Yet it does not
always follow that this is the case, for a
telegram has been known to be transmitted
eyes" when the copy made it "No, !" with
copper plate or poster type distinctness.
WEAK ELECTRICAL CIRCUITS.
Long and weak circuits (electricaD are
also indirectly responsible for mistakes,
even though competent and careful oper-
ators may preside at both ends of the line.
Letters composed entirely of dots are often
metamorphosed, an e being received as an
j, for instance, the second dot of which the
o is composed becoming attached to the fol-
lowing letter and completely changing the
photography; or an may turn out an
and combined, the dots becoming separated
through faulty working of the electric cur
rent, thus ''falling out " as the telegrapher
explains, or else running together. Either
cause will alter letters, and unless the receiv-
ing operator is exceptionally careful and
quick to guess the meaning OF pulled
words he may perpetrate errors which will
cost him salary as well as reputation.
As has been mentioned above, long cir
cults and weak electrical currents frequently
play the mischief with dots and dashes.
They ''fall out, as the operators say, van
ish or commingle, until, oftentimes, two
or more letters are blended or, as with short
letters fail entirely to go through. This
might account for Transforming baseball
into ''baz BAN gag" where and and II
are liable to be misunderstood for and m
Another, with which many expert oper-
ators are familiar, is the old time "Cog hog
Jags is not 100," when it was intended that
the recipient should understand he was to
"Come home. James is not WELL" Here
the receiving operator pobably has COM
o1J IF odinor INV cO1Inh
for me, the signs for which are quite SINH
lar, while "well," if not carefully read (by
sound, is liable to be transformed into
600" Of course, no careful operator
would permit such a perversion of words to
leave his hands; still such messages have
been sent cut, no doubt to the great bewil-
derment of those for whom they were in
tended.
"When the swamows hogward fy'' was
what careless ''plug" operator made OF
the familiar quotation which came to him
one night in special telegram to New
York paper. If he read the paper mex,
day, he was no doubt surprised to discover
that it had been turned by the careful tele
graph editor into "When the Swallow
Homeward Fly" 1t must have been thu
same telegrapher who made John Howard
Payne's beautiful lines read, "Hog, wo
Hog, there's no place like hog.
It would appear to be impossible to turn
a message reading simply "No'' into eyes,
vet instances of this kind are by no mean
rare. They are the result, no doubt, Of alb
sent mindedness, the sending operator, per
haps, being engaged in an interesting con
versation with some associate in his office
as not infrequently happens, as he ticks OF
the letters which entirely change the mean
Ing of some very important business mes
sage. Another example of carelessness wa
in a message sent from San Francisco to
lady in New York by her husband, who i
endeavoring to advise her laconically an
cheaply as to what she should do abou
Joining him, wrote in the blank, "Do moth
ing about furniture This was turne
into ''Do nothing without furniture" an
the result was the recipient, satisfied sh
was to take furniture with her, investe
81, 900 in household goods, to discover late
on that they were not wanted. AS conse
ouence suit was brought against the CON
pany.
BLUNDERS OF BAD WRITING.
Blind writing is rasponible for many G
. the blunders made in sending messages, as
lOI luSIulICe, nlOIlSl 20 NOiJ 'Siij ~
: In reality ''mother'' was very ill.
. "Mother died to-day" went through from
: eouthern office and was received ut NeN
York weather bad to-day" There ma
? be some excuse for confounding weathe
!: and mother from similarity of the Mors
II sounds mo and wea, but no explanation Q
this kind would account for misreadln
5 "bad' for "died".
d "Send check this afternoon" has bee
| made to read "Send chase this afternoon
"Your bacon" has become "Your banker
a and "Salmon received" has been metamol
d phosed into "Balloon received "Send Il
e more was wired by a commission me
+ chant to a party erom whom he was recei'
:; ing large quantities of produce for sale, an
:. it put the recipient to much inconvenient
:. and eventually subjected him to considerab
ID loss, for the message as he received it real
s. "Send on more" and he exerted himse
VI accordingly to meet the demand.
When "The Mikado' was produced fl
the first time in New York critic TO
warded On account of the performance
his paper in the west. The report was
be "dropped'' to a newspaper in Detroi
In giving the cast the character of Ko-K
occurred and the New York operator tickt
off the letters, first inserting quotatic
{ points and ending with the same 1t ha
Il pens that the Geographic code sign for
2 colon Is k O, and the Detroit operator, wi
i, had probably never heard Of ''The Mikado
and was ignorant of the existence of sue